


Stand at the Edge of the Sea

by o_contrary



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: F/M, Light Angst, Non-Linear Narrative
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-31
Updated: 2020-08-31
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:14:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26211757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/o_contrary/pseuds/o_contrary
Summary: Phryne entered his life as Miss Fisher, a whirlwind of red and white-clad dark hair and French perfume, scattering incisive observations in her wake that swiftly proved pointless to try to discount, given her razor-sharp instincts.Many things swiftly proved pointless: telling herno, asking her to wait for backup, or to stop that at once... mainly telling her no.
Relationships: Phryne Fisher/Jack Robinson
Comments: 18
Kudos: 72





	Stand at the Edge of the Sea

**Author's Note:**

> This was not what I had imagined being my first offering here, but it turns out I had to get it out of the old brainpan, d'oh! I took Crypt of Tears into account, but this doesn't touch on it directly in any way. Touches on various points throughout the TV series.

“Come after me,” Phryne had said, voice light and breathless. Exhilarated at the idea of flight, underlain with a tremble of earnest hope.

Jack wondered if she knew she was taking his heart with her, that it was only his physical body that must remain behind. For one wild moment he had contemplated flagging them down to try and configure some manner of lashing himself to the plane’s frame and going with them that way.

Parting ways at the end of a case was one thing; there was rarely a shortage of murder, and sometimes it was mere days between one case to another. Over the horizon, there was no guarantee he’d ever see her again.

Haring off into the sunset, though, that just wasn’t how he operated. He could and had put his badge and his life and his heart on the line for her in so many ways, but just leaving the rest of his responsibilities with no notice was one disruption to his sense of order too far.

His heart, common and unglamorous, had to be enough for now.

~*~

Even as a small child, Jack was an excellent swimmer. In summer he could hardly be dragged out of the water, especially before he sold Uncle Ted’s coin collection for a bicycle.

“Little Jacky-fish,” his mother had laughed, shooing him to go wash the salt and sand off. “You’re going to grow gills one day.”

~*~

Phryne entered his life as Miss Fisher, a whirlwind of red and white-clad dark hair and French perfume, scattering incisive observations in her wake that swiftly proved pointless to try to discount, given her razor-sharp instincts.

Many things swiftly proved pointless: telling her _no_ , asking her to wait for backup, or to stop that at once... mainly telling her no.

Phryne may have entered his life as a whirlwind, but soon became as inexorable to him as the tide, in and out, in and out. There at his crime scenes, in his office, the morgue, and before long, he in her parlor, going over their cases, sharing nightcaps.

The tide answered only to the moon; Phryne answered only to herself.

That had been clear from the start.

~*~

Jack flew once, during the War; an intelligence mission so clandestine he’d forced himself to forget the details.

What he did remember was never being so cold in his life, and the curious peace of being far above where the guns below could get them, for a short while.

~*~

_“Do you have a card? In case I need to call the police,” she’d said, played the coquette to the hilt as she brushed a finger along the raven-dark hair at her cheek and widened her captivating grey eyes. “I’m a woman alone, newly arrived in a dangerous town.”_

_“I plan to make the town less dangerous, Miss Fisher.”_

_“Good, I do like a man with a plan, Detective-Inspector Jack Robinson.”_

She’d given him a slow, calculating once-over, designed to make him fluster on her way out.

It hadn’t, then, but it was a near thing.

It was, however, a portent of things to come.

Her announcement of her new endeavor as a _Lady Detective_ had sent his brain into a wild scurry to find some straws to grasp. Perhaps it wouldn’t be to her liking; these crimes hadn’t been bloody. She hadn’t seen any bodies up close, and getting trapped in a steam room lacked a certain degree of violence. Maybe there would be more murders like Mr. Anderson’s and she’d find herself bored and move on to something else.

Failing those, maybe they simply wouldn’t cross paths often.

Deep down, he’d known these were a mere exercise in futility; she was far too tenacious to give up so easily. More than that, she’d already shown her mettle several times over in the span of a few days, right down to a miraculously non-lethal fireball that wiped out the dregs of Lydia Anderson’s cocaine empire.

What he still hadn’t counted on was her taking such a shine to him, a by-the-book detective who believed in operating within the confines of the law. There was no escaping her aptitude at finding crime scenes that ultimately would require his presence, whether she’d requested him first or not, nor her knack for “stumbling” on scenes he was already investigating.

He’d thus resigned himself early to dealing with her outrageous, overwhelming presence and tried to tell himself it sparked nothing in him to spar with her over details.

“I’d be surprised if anyone found them, except… you, Inspector,” said atop a train outside Ballarat was the beginning of taking the wind out of his sails; a direct hit on his ego. They both knew it, too.

Solving cases with her was frustrating, infuriating and terrifying by turns. He hadn’t gone into police work to be entertained, but above all, working cases with Phryne was _exciting_ , for better or worse.

~*~

One of the nurses at Abbeville had read folktales and mythology to the unfortunates who just needed company while they were lost, staring at the ceiling. Jack was there long enough to hear a few he hadn’t been familiar with before; he always liked it when she spoke of selkies.

Fascinating creatures, to have a pathway to existing between the land and the sea just by changing their skins. What must it be like, he’d wondered, struck with a deep anguish, to just escape under the waves for a time? To live in the water, unbothered by the foibles of man?

The thought had lingered long after he returned home; at times he could see it in his own eyes in the mirror, in the dark hollows and deep lines.

Rosie had been able to see it, too.

Neither of them could ever figure out how to talk about it.

~*~

Phryne had flirted with him from the start, as she did with everyone; he hadn’t counted himself special. Just as information-gathering methods went, she was spectacularly effective with it. He also liked to think he had his finger on the pulse of when he was being manipulated, such as when she wanted access to a body, or a crime scene, or a coroner’s report, or an investigation. It was good practice for his poker face, if nothing else, and deeply amusing watching her spin the unwary around.

Where it began to get complicated was in how much more time he spent with her than the average person outside her direct household. They got to _know_ each other, and growing more personal was inevitable as the tide.

Her powder was never wasted on him, much as he tried not to give that impression more than he could help, but more and more, she seemed genuinely pleased to see him. He tried to put on a good show, but in most instances, he was glad to see her, too, even when it was the kind of case that sent his heart straight to his throat at the thought of her involvement. In spite of himself, he began looking forward to opportunities to surprise her in his own right, too.

She started helping herself to his personal space, his personal stash, his toast in the mornings; it was easy to linger over things that didn’t require the extra time. It was easy to make time for her that he didn’t actually have.

That, he did think, was a little special, that she kept coming back to him, even if it was just for the crimes.

~*~

They’d shared a bed, once, though not with any carnal purpose or end.

After they’d escaped Foyle, she had been too distraught once the poison wore off to let go of his jacket. With the clocking Foyle had given him, he’d been in no fit state to drive; tracers had swum across his vision with the throbbing and his stomach had rolled.

He hadn’t even gotten under the covers with her, and prior to the incident with her father’s nerve tonic, he still wouldn’t have been able to give a single detail about Phryne’s boudoir other than possibly purple.

She’d just clung to him and let him hold her, forehead pressed to his chest while she trembled. That trust was its own gift, a bloom of tenderness in those miserable hours.

He had extricated himself only a couple of hours later, taking pains not to disturb her save for a single brush of lips to her temple, a stroke of his hand over her dark hair. Then, he’d tiptoed out to prepare for a long day of cleaning up the ashes.

It was much harder to even pretend to be keeping himself at an arm’s length after that.

As for Phryne, she had clearly been restraining herself, before, though his divorce may have had something to do with that as well. She hadn’t a careful bone in her body, but for the ways it turned out she was careful with him.

They just, through everything, drew together like magnets.

~*~

Rosie was his first, but not only, if one counted a couple of desperate wartime assignations to chase the despair of the front away. Jack strove to be an honest man, so he did.

He told Rosie about them when he got home; that wasn’t the kind of thing one spoke of in a letter.

They were part of him, though, as much as the scars on his sides, low between his hip and groin and to his lower back that made it uncomfortable to stand both still and completely upright. They had also been the easiest part of what he had brought home with him for Rosie to understand.

A whole three partners and a years long dry spell were nonetheless daunting, when he began truly allowing himself to consider that Miss Fisher seemed open to – was even encouraging – moving beyond their friendship to something more physically intimate.

That she would welcome him in her bed hadn’t been in question for some time; the question was, what of it.

A dalliance was out of the question for him, particularly where Phryne was concerned. Those feelings ran far too deep, deep as the Pacific Ocean Phryne had compared him to on an occasion she made it perfectly clear he only ever need ask. There was power in that, and he took pains to treat that power with respect.

Likewise was the suggestion she give up her lovers out of the question; that was a certain path to nothing but resentment and pain.

They were both, he thought, playing the long game.

Back and forth, back and forth; she with a patience as vast as the ocean, he the stones she was wearing down, one wave at a time.

~*~

_”There’s a whole world out there, Jack. He’s the least of your worries.”_

Her parting words ricocheted through his brain while his mouth still tingled from their kiss and the faint smear of lipstick she’d left behind. They settled slowly, like shells drifting on a current as he watched the plane take flight, banking in the grey-blue sky for her to wave goodbye.

He thought of selkies again, creatures who may live on land for a time by hiding their skins, but must ultimately return to the sea lest they wither away.

He never had grown gills; there wasn’t a way for him yet to follow her out into the water and stay there without drowning. Like a selkie, she was far too wild a thing to ever stay on land for long, and he would never keep her pelt from her.

As he watched the plane fade to a tiny dot on the horizon, he pressed a hand over the ache in his chest, and hoped if he stood long enough at her shore, Phryne would return to him, secret away her pelt again, and stay for just a little while longer.

~fin

**Author's Note:**

> _Because there's nothing more beautiful than the way the ocean refuses to stop kissing the shoreline, no matter how many times it's sent away. - Sarah Kay_
> 
> Thanks for reading!


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